Free is Dead
by RoseblossomWarrior
Summary: Makoto and Nagisa have spent all day trying to find Haruka, and they finally supposed that maybe he'd be over at the boarding school's pool. [Major character death. One-side MakoHaru if you squint.]


_I don't own Free! So, some post on tumblr was all "I want Free! to be dark as hell," so this happened. I'm sorry. (No I'm not. Well...I'm sad. Not sorry.)_

* * *

Someone grabbed Makoto's shoulder and roughly shook him. Makoto awoke with a yell, throwing out his arms and smacking whoever was touching him in the chin.

"W-wha?!" he sputtered. "I just want five more… Nagisa?"

The blonde boy was rubbing his chin, obviously in pain, but when his name was called, he sprang to attention again—and Makoto noticed that he was rigid, his eyes wide with fear and agitation. "Mako-chan! Mako-chan, we have to hurry!"

Makoto's sleepiness had instantly faded, but he was confused. He and Nagisa had been riding on the train when he'd fallen asleep—they'd been headed toward Rin's boarding school, because they hadn't been able to find Haruka all afternoon and they'd supposed that maybe he'd gone to sneak into the goddamn pool again.

Nagisa leaped to his feet and pulled Makoto up so they could rush off the train. "Gou-chan called me—she said—she said Rin-chan and Haru-chan—"

After that, it was hard for the boy to form coherent sentences. Makoto tried to ask him questions—"What did she say?" "Has something happened to Haru-chan?" "_Nagisa, what the hell happened?!_"—but Nagisa just shook his head and continued his sprint toward the school. Some awful weight clenched itself around Makoto's heart and lungs, and though it was so hard to breathe, he hurried ahead of Nagisa, his longer legs aiding his stride.

They didn't give a damn about sneaking into the pool—they barged right in. Gou and Rin, the two redheaded siblings, sat on the tiled floor, both of them behaving quite differently. Gou was sobbing loudly, her voice broken, her clothes somewhat wet and her hair askew. Rin rested on his hands and knees, pool water streaming from his skin, and he was gasping for air. He stared sightlessly at the floor.

"What happened?!" Makoto rushed to Rin and grabbed him roughly by the shoulders, forcing him to look into his eyes. "_Tell me what the hell happened!"_

Rin's eyes were still wide. "H-he won the race," he whispered, his jaw hanging open a little. "He won, and I-I…" He started to tremble, to shake, and Makoto almost shoved him away when he let go.

"_Haru-chan!" _Nagisa screeched, and Makoto shot to his feet and looked out into the pool. The lighting was dim, but he could make out a dark shape in the water.

Makoto didn't give the slightest damn about taking off his uniform or shoes or whatever the hell he was wearing. He rushed to the edge of the pool and jumped into the water, swimming out to the dark shape with haphazard strokes before diving down and grabbing hold of Haruka. he struggled back up to the surface and gasped in air before lifting Haruka's head. Haruka didn't breathe.

"Haru-chan, just hang on!" Makoto said. He said a lot of things—"Hang on, just hang on" and "It'll be okay"—and Nagisa jumped in the pool to help him pull Haruka to the edge. Makoto pulled himself out, his soaked clothes weighing him down, and with Nagisa's help they dragged Haruka up onto the tiled floor.

Makoto put his hands over Haruka's chest and pumped downward. "Breathe, dammit." He put his lips over Haruka's, pinching his nose and breathing sweet air into his mouth and lungs, then repeated the process. Pump, pinch nose, breathe, repeat—pump, pinch nose, breathe, repeat. He lost count of how many times he did it.

Finally, a hand fell on his shoulder. "M-Mako-chan…"

Makoto roughly pushed Nagisa away. "He's _alive_, he's gotta be alive!" He turned back to Haruka and shook him by the shoulders. Something splashed onto his chest, and Makoto was unaware that it was his own tears. "Haru, come on! W-wake up."

Haruka neither moved nor made any sound.

"_Haru, _come on—come on, let's go to the pool. The pool sounds nice, right? W-we'll go the whole day, you, me, and Nagisa-chan. O-or, we'll go to a water park. Doesn't that sound fun?"

Makoto kept expecting for Haruka to open his sea-blue eyes, for them to shine with excitement at the prospect of swimming, but nothing happened.

For a moment, Makoto was still. He breathed hard. Tears dropped from his green eyes onto Haruka's cold, wet chest.

"He…he's dead?"

Makoto looked up at Rin, whose red eyes were wide with disbelief and guilt.

Guilt.

A white-hot rage built up inside Makoto, and he almost slipped on the tile floor as he launched himself at Rin. He gave no thought to their childhood friendship as he punched Rin in the jaw. He only thought about Haruka—about how he would always be late to school because he took baths for two fucking hours, about how he would wear swim trunks instead of goddamn boxers under his pants, about how he would only be excited about the ocean or the pool or any goddamn body of water, hardly ever about school or Nagisa's antics or Makoto's own goddamn day—

"_Mako-chan!"_

Nagisa grabbed Makoto, but because he was so small, he couldn't pull him away from Rin, who was bleeding from his lip and nose—who wasn't even putting up a fight at all. Makoto ignored Nagisa and kept trying to hit every square inch of Rin that he could reach, but then Gou was there, too, helping to pull Makoto away from her brother. Makoto fought against them, but their combined effort was enough to pull him away.

He struggled uselessly, but eventually gave up and lay down on the tile floor, too exhausted to move. The light from the almost-dead sun streamed in through the windows, partially lighting up Haruka's body.

Makoto squeezed his eyes shut tight, trying to fight the tears, but they had been coming all along.

_"HARUKA!"_


End file.
